O’Rourke’s mom discusses past Dem votes after labeled ‘lifelong Republican’ by son

Democratic Senate candidate Beto O’Rourke’s (Texas) mother commented on her political inclinations after CNN’s KFile found that her voting record may contradict her son’s assertion that she is a lifelong Republican.

Melissa O’Rourke told CNN’s KFile Tuesday that she had supported Republicans nationally and Democrats regionally, until President Trump.

“The immigration, the wall, the rhetoric that’s coming out. It’s just so far right. It’s just — there’s no humanity,” she said of the current Republican Party.

“But for the most part I have voted Republican probably nationally and then more regionally, more Democrats,” she said.

She said she voted in Democratic primaries because “that’s the party that’s going to win” in El Paso and that she could not remember why she voted in Republican primaries in 2006 and 2010.

{mosads}According to CNN’s KFile, O’Rourke’s voting record shows she has voted in Democratic primaries for 15 of the last 17 elections.

That includes 2000, 2008, 2012 and 2016 when presidential nominees were on the ticket.

She voted in the Republican Party primaries only twice, in 2006 and 2010 midterms, and has donated to both parties.

Beto O’Rourke’s communications director Chris Evans told CNN’s KFile that Melissa O’Rourke always voted for a Republican president “with the exception of 2016.”

Yet she told CNN’s KFile that she could not recall if she voted for former President Obama in 2008. She donated $250 to his campaign.

“You know, I remember Beto was so high on him and telling me all about him. I remember being excited by it and you know, to be very honest with you, I can’t tell you if I did or not,” she said.

“I didn’t vote for him the second time but I can’t swear to you I didn’t the first.”

The report came two hours before Beto O’Rourke and his Republican opponent Sen. Ted Cruz (Texas) engaged in their second and likely final debate.

O’Rourke admitted that his mother’s political opinions were complex in a stump speech in August, in which he said she considered herself an “‘an independent now.'”

Melissa O’Rourke has campaigned for her son in his fight against Cruz.

Cruz leads Beto O’Rourke by an average of 7 points across several polls, according to RealClearPolitics.